Rossco01 Learning Log

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So a new forum a new opportunity to create my roadcase…but a little too much to transfer across and give you the history from day 1 to the present. So as an alternative below is both my very first post in the roadcase on the old forum back in March 2013 (when I was most definitely just starting out) and my most recent post in July 2021 celebrating the first live performance of my band Retrospective…not bad to go from zero in 2013 to playing live in 8 years! and quite a bit has happened since then.

March 2013
So Im on 999 posts and it seemed like a 1000 posts should be marked slightly differently to reflect not only on my guitar journey but also on the forum. Not least because I’ve never posted for so long or so much on a web forum.

The guitar journey is fairly straight forward and in common with many on here. My good wife bought me a guitar in 2002 unfortunately before Justin Guitar and just before my daughter was born. Easy learner book ( and CD ) in hand I plodded along for a few months without getting anywhere. Said daughter arrived, time disappeared and my guitar began its journey around the house ending up in the garage.

Roll forward ten years, a colleagues wife bought him a guitar and I thought. … what if? I dug it out, plodded a bit and the fortunately stumbled across Justin on YouTube… and so began the journey. Over 2 years on I can play better than I could have ever imagined then. … and not half as well as I’d like. It’s taken hard practice ( most days) and lots of support from people on here. I know it takes a lot longer than you think but practicing brings tiny increments of progress that add up to a lot.

Without the forum I would have probably given up. At the start it provided the knowledge and support that I was actually tackling things in the right way. I discovered the audio video of you playing section, and the beginners song book thread ( where would I be without the bsb). I tentatively posted and got supportive feedback. I made friends DeConne, Pipsickle, Sweed77, TobyJenner, Rolandson to name but a few who were also beginners but also more experienced players and admins like close, tbav. It gave me confidence to keep practicing and learning songs.

Over time as others have come along ive seen that community spirit all the time and tried to give a the bit back I can to encourage others in the same way I was encouraged. I may not be a great player but a positive word goes a long way imho.

So a big thank you to all those that have supported and encouraged me. Lots of encouragement to those at the start of the journey and of course a massive thank you to Justin.

Roll on the next 1000 posts!

July 2021
So for once it’s not actually been that long since I revisited my Road Case but things have certainly moved a little so worthy of an update!

First off I’ve moved a lot in terms of performance…first taking part in a number of local to me VIRTUAL open mics and then introducing the concept to the forum which seemed to land pretty well I think you’ll agree.

Then as a duo we actually got to play live (yes really live) for the first time at an Open Mic and of course you all know how that went (as it’s posted on the Live Performance thread). Initially a bit nerve wracking but actually after a few minutes you start to enjoy it.

So the latest update (as a few of you know) is that we’re now fully fledged three piece band with real life drummer. We’ve been practicing for about 5 weeks together and it was certainly a little different to start with but seems to be working out well now. We did our first open mic together last Friday repeating one of the songs from the last one and two new songs (Dont You Forget About Me and Zombie) which seemed to go down well. A little clip below but we should get some better quality footage from the OM organiser shortly and I’ll post that in the Live Performance section for those interested.

We’ll probably have a break from performing over rest of July and August as most of us have holidays of some shape or form…then come back to performing in September. We still have our booking for a Charity event at the beginning of October where we’ll be one of four bands performing. We will probably have around an hour so we’ll need around 9-10 songs ready at that point. That will hopefully get us set up for some proper gigs later on. The chap running the OM we attend is also looking to organise band nights for 2-3 bands and has asked if we’d be interested so that could be another outlet for a longer set.

Anyway that’s the little update for now! I’m doing bugger all in terms of extending my “skills” other than learning new songs and rehearsing…still it forces improvements in other ways.

For all of those wondering will Justin Guitar really teach me guitar…take a little trek down my memory lane on Sound Cloud and get accustomed with my first Three Little Birds recording (it’s still there)…that was only in 2014 so not so long ago!

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So borrowing from Toby’s Idea I’ve collated all my Soundcloud tracks in to a playlist so it’s easy to share here.

This is very interesting because it is a potted history of my guitar learning journey over the last 7 years. I did do a minor cull some time ago but I retained tracks from the whole period of time including my very first two (Mad World and Three Little Birds). I haven’t posted anything new there for probably a year since I very much moved across to YT.

Interesting to see how much of my older songs are all acoustic whereas as now I’m almost 100% electric…something I intend to change in the new year.

Anyway for those looking for a “journey” feel free to listen.

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Okay I was going to share each playlist for YT as well but unfortunately even when you share the link to the playlist it sets up the first song rather than a link to the playlist. Oh Well.

Here is a link to my channel with separate playlists for my Solo Covers and Band Covers/Rehearsals.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHlzgAndj0AFFSNE1iGnbQQ

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Good job, Jason. Your journey is an inspiration to me. It’s been encouraging to track your progress from the time I joined here nearly 5 years ago. And the insights, information, and encouragement you share with all is invaluable.

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I think the opportunity to collate recordings using playlists in YT or SC, starting afresh in the new Community, is a great way of not only reviewing your own progress (let’s face it how many times do you go back and listen to those early days ?) and seeing how far you’ve come but demonstrating to others what cam be achieved.

Thanks for sharing Jason @Rossco01 .

Cheers

Toby
:sunglasses:

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You are impressive Jason, for so many reasons. Thankyou for being the inspiration you are.

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Oh your Wonderful Tonight is beautiful, along with many others. Great progress through your musical journey. I listened to several and you keep getting better and better. You have accomplished so much in eight years. Oh, and Wicked Game - all of them were great!

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That is very kind of you to say Pam and thank you for listening to some - very old - songs. Good to still have them to track how I’ve improved over the years.

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I can clearly see looking back at this that I’ve been very pro-active (not) at keeping this up to date.

So a v.quick recap of the year and then looking forward:-

Gigs, gigs and more gigs.
Yep you got it the year has mainly been about continuing to grow the band and do more gigs. Alongside regular Open Mics we dropped on some really decent ones this year including a few small local festivals and that enables us to build a bit of a portfolio of what we’ve done and get a bit more credibility for other events. As we reflected the other day we’ve only been playing together as a band since July 21 so have made pretty good progress so far.

The only disappointment so far is lack of paid work and decent pub gigs. To be honest we don’t want LOTS of work (as we all work fulltime and have families) but 1-2 a month where we are playing a couple of hours would really iron out the kinks in the sets. At the moment we have to ramp up for each gig.

Songs
Well on the positive side we have lots of songs now and can comfortably cover the 2 hours needed. It’s also pretty mixed so we can tailor a setlist to suit the sort of gig it is. On the down side it’s a hell of job to keep things current and familiar. Getting into a cycle of keeping all songs fresh is pretty hard work. I can also see us starting to drop some and add some just to keep things fresh.

Another positive - at least from my perspective - is that we’re starting to add little more complexity to songs. Some of the songs being more challenging in themselves and also including some of the solo stuff. Still very much a work in progress but something to focus on this year.

Practice
Well I would say “structured” learning and practice was a bit non existent last year. I certainly haven’t worked through any lessons or pushed that skill set up a notch.

The Year Ahead

The band will continue to be a focus and getting some repeat festival gigs would be a good start. Pushing into some paid work will also be a target this year so plenty of social media stuff and even more networking to get some opportunities will be key.

From a song perspective we’ve got 3 or 4 songs on the go at the moment and the focus for me is to make sure that I deliver on the solo/lead aspects of the songs where possible. Last Nite by the Strokes, Mollys Chambers are the focus right now. We’ve got Teenage Kicks done already (including the simple lead/solo). Individually these take no time to learn from a rhythm perspective but I know I’ll be spending lots of time on the solos.

The other angle I’d like to get back to is acoustic and I’m currently learning Landslide by Fleetwood Mac. I like fingerstyle but haven’t played it for a while. I’ve found the verse part for it not too bad (and the travis picking comes reasonably naturally) but the Chorus is more challenging. The intention is to get Lisa to sing this and me to play it so that will be something new. It’s surprisingly challenging to play but NOT sing when you’ve always done it.

So there we go that’s the very succinct and short list of things to tackle this year…if by the end of it we’ve had one paid gig, I’m playing solos in songs more comfortably AND I’ve done a little more on acoustic I’ll be happy with that.

FOCUS as always is the challenge!

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Living a dream, Jason.

Perhaps at some point sharing the story from first ideas and steps to where you are now would interest some folk.

Your plans look good.

Like your idea to add Landslide as something different. Would Lisa come out from behind the drums and it be done a little like a Brian and Freddie, Mick and Keith moment, mid-show, just the singer and acoustic guitar?

Irrespective look forward to more Retrospective

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Really fantastic to see how far you’ve come Jason and it sound like a really productive year.
You may not be doing any formal lessons as such but you are still learning and developing in many ways, especially in the dynamics of the band. So new and more complex songs and extending those forays into lead play, is all still learning at the end of the day.
Best of luck for 2023, look forward to the gig reports and stories of your life on the road !

:sunglasses:

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Good idea David and at some point I’ll do that. It’s interesting because I see the thread on being in a rut and whilst I’ve certainly been close to it at times having a goal or or something I’d like to do…and trying very hard to do it has kept me out of the rut. I think the goal narrows the focus a little more and you can then identify what you need to do next rather than trying to swallow the elephant that it could be.

Yep the aim is for a “break” in the set to allow Lisa to come from behind the drums and sing whilst I play. It may end up as a duo as my range is probably slightly higher than Lisa’s. We did a run through of the verses last week and it work well in a different way to what else we do. I think the contrast will be good. The lesson I’m following introduces some melody notes in the chorus (which I think are in the original too) so it’s slightly more complicated picking. However I’m willing to stick at it for weeks to try and get it right as it feels doable rather than impossible.

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I was wondering who else was still around from the forum when I was last active there.
Glad to hear you’re still progressing.

And having just seen your soundcloud image, I’ll leave this for you-
image

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A nightmare! :laughing:
I have trouble remembering two songs, let alone two hours of material :roll_eyes: :rofl:
Always good to read your updates, Jason

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Very much so… I’ve enjoyed reading the RC/LLs of my peers on here… reading about their journey from when they first started to where they are today and listening to their back catalogue of AVoYPs they recorded along the way. I find them very inspirational. would love to read about taking those first steps from working through JG course to starting a band to where you are today.

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I always wondered if you and the band have been working in the background on any originals?

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Great to read your progress and goals especially at your dizzy heights!

Let’s get Justin pushed for this in person open mic :crossed_fingers: @Richard_close2u

I know the guy that organises our local open mic has released a couple of albums and gets a few live gigs off the back of those. Any song writers among your merry crew?

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@Socio I will be openly honest and say we are 99% a covers band…but we have dabbled and I have written 3 originals, 1 of which we never play, 1 of which we rarely plan and 1 of which we play reasonably often. That I penned all three in about 2 days should mean we have oodles of originals but that’s just not the case. On those couple of days (and they were written whilst I was working) it just seemed to flow and I managed to get lyrics and rough chord progressions done quickly. Since then (and it’s probably been more than a year) I really haven’t felt compelled to do it. Maybe that should be another objective for end of year…get an ep written and published!

But back to your point on whether that drums up gigs it’s yes and no…for certain “festivals” they like a band to play originals as well (particularly the big ones) for pubs not so much. We know a few bands who started out playing mostly originals and most now do as many covers.

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Jason what a wonderful update, glad you popped in and let us know how it’s been with your own and band’s journey. Wish you luck with getting paid gigs, by looking at your uploads I can clearly tell you just need one lucky gig where someone will spot you and has some gigs to fill out with a band. On a downside the economy is not in a good spot atm so definitely pub owners etc are looking ways to save money and not spend it. Nevertheless I am sure this year you will get some nice gigs into your portfolio :slight_smile: get your FB fanpage running, put some videos on, ask members here to like it (I would be happy to personally to get you some more fanbase) and play on! :wink:

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Jason, great to hear it’s going well. Interesting to see a bit of the behind the scenes of how bands come together and grow.